Faq

The California Legal Update is available on request to anyone who is interested. We report only the law as decided by the appellate courts and present briefs as objectively as possible while keeping editorial comments to a minimum. The California Legal Update contains no professional secrets or privileged information.

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You have not been dropped from the Update e-mail list. Upon submitting a request, you automatically receive a boilerplate response that you are on the Update e-mail list. You will not be dropped unless we receive notification that you have quit, retired, or no longer wish to receive the Update. If you let us know that you are not receiving the Update, we will work with you to resolve the issue. It might be that your employer is blocking the Update notifications, or there may be another problem. Please click here to review our instructions how to get notifications past spam blockers (aka/ “Whitelist Us”).

Yes. We will send the e-mail notifications to as many addresses as you request.

You do not get the California Legal Update directly. You receive an e-mail notification that a new Update has been published and a link that you can use to connect to the latest Update. You can retrieve older editions of the Update via the same notification page. You can choose to receive rolling update alerts (as each case is posted to the site), our monthly issues (all recent updates consolidated into one report), or both.

No. We have thousands of subscribers so using the Postal Service would be impractical and very expensive. We send the Update out only via Internet e-mail.

We offer two plans. Please click here to review our plans page and subscribe. The Basic Plan is free. However, we encourage everyone to become a Professional Member so that you can enjoy full access to our site at a nominal cost.

No. The California Legal Update subscription list is confidential and will not be released to anyone for any purpose, no matter how laudable.

It depends. Mr. Phillips is not available to advise individuals on personal legal issues. He also does not provide private individuals with legal advice on matters that may or may not be related to criminal justice.

Mr. Phillips will answer legal search and seizure-related questions for law enforcement officers, prosecutors, private attorneys and their employees subscribed to our Professional Membership, if the questions pertain to issues within his area of expertise. He is not available to legally represent anyone or to make court appearances.

No. Although Mr. Phillips retains his membership in the California Bar, he does not maintain a legal practice.

No. Mr. Phillips, who lives out-of-state, no longer travels to California for the purpose of conducting live training sessions.

Extensive training outlines on various search and seizure issues are available to those subscribed to our Professional Membership.

The following training outlines and informational memos are available under our "Special Updates" section of our website. They are updated as new cases (and new relevant statutes) come out, unless indicated otherwise:

  • Fourth Amendment Search and Seizure (updated annually).
  • Fifth Amendment/Miranda (updated annually).
  • Sixth Amendment Rights to an Attorney and to Confrontation
  • New and Amended Statutes (updated annually)
  • First Amendment Expressive Activity
  • Lineups
  • Marijuana
  • Mental Patients and Weapons
  • Pawned Property
  • Legal Update Index

Other informational memos are available on a vast array of topics.